Shahriyar Jamshidi

BIOGRAPHY

Shahriyar Jamshidi was born in Kermanshah, Iran. He holds a Bachelor of Music from the Tehran University of Art in 1978. He received his Kamanche training with celebrated musicians such as Mahmood Merati, Mojtaba Mirzadeh and Ardeshir Kamkar, focusing on the study of Kurdish music in order to reconstruct the old songs of the Kurds, his people. Over 24 years of his career, he has been attempting to recreate the classical Kurdish music in an understandable way for younger generations. He considers this effort as a cultural bridge between past and future. In 2003, Shahriyar founded the Dilan Ensemble (derived from the name of the Kurdish musician Qadir Dilan), which has since performed numerous times in Tehran, Iran. Shahriyar has also performed on several well-known Kurdish TV channels including Kurdistan, Newroz, and Kurdsat. As a composer, he has devoted his career to preserving the ancient music history of Kurdistan. Now based in Toronto, Canada, Shahriyar hopes to introduce Kurdish music and the Kamanche to a wider audience, having already performed at Iranian Heritage Day at the Royal Ontario Museum in May 2013, Toronto's Tirgan Festival in July 2013 and International Society for Improvised Music ISIM festival and conference, Chateau D’oex, Switzerland, July 2015. He has released three albums including: Alvanati (2004), Call of the Mountains (2008) and A Yellow Flower (2014).